Hurly Burly!

2001-07-09.

After church yesterday, ******* and I went browsing through Book Wagon in Megamall for piano and guitar scores, and we found a book of popular English songs from the 18th Century. One particularly engaging tidbit was the score for Haydn’s Sailor Song, a delightful little ditty about the life of an English sailor. We sang along with it for a bit. (Best sung with a stentorian tenor voice. The more bombastic the better.)

High on the giddy bending mast

The seaman furls the rending sail,

And, fearless of the rushing blast,

He careless whistles to the gale.

Rattling ropes and rolling seas,

Hurlyburly, hurlyburly,

War nor death can him displease.

The hostile foe his vessel seeks,

High bounding o’er the raging main,

The roaring cannon loudly speaks,

‘Tis Britain’s glory we maintain.

‘Tis Britain’s glo-ory we maintain!

Rattling ropes and rolling seas,

Hurlyburly, hurlyburly,

Hurlyburly, hurlyburly,

Wa-ar nor de-eath can him displease,

can him displease!

I spent dinner at Hutu’s Hut in Rockwell for a Pinoyexchange moderators’ meeting, stuffing myself silly with “Pumba”, or lemon-grass porkchops — and earning myself an almighty grease-headache in the process. After the cab ride home, I was unpleasantly surprised to discover that the single P500 bill in my wallet was counterfeit. (And it had come from a bank ATM. Really, this country.) I had to rush up to my apartment to retrieve a real P500 bill to pay the fare — to a cab driver who didn’t have change. So I had to run to the village convenience store and get it changed. That didn’t help my headache.

When the mess had been untangled, I plopped into bed, once again without showering, hoping to sleep off my aching head. No sooner had my head hit the pillow when a stiff north wind started to blow into the window. Aaaahhh, a breath of fresh air was just the thing to help a tired man.

Then it started raining. Hard. The formerly welcome north wind began to blow water into my room as well as fresh air, and I was pelted with droplets. I was forced to close the windows to both air and water, and my room grew stuffy. My headache got worse, but I managed to doze.

I was awakened at 1.20 am by a mild earthquake. That didn’t help either.